TikTok has implemented Oracle infrastructure in the United States in order to allay concerns about the Chinese government accessing consumer data in the United States.
The Chinese social networking company revealed its use of Oracle infrastructure in the United States in a blog post this week.
TikTok wrote the following:
TikTok has long stored US user data in our own data centers in the US and Singapore. For more than a year, we’ve been working with Oracle on several measures as part of our commercial relationship to better safeguard our app, systems, and the security of US user data. We’ve now reached a significant milestone in that work: we’ve changed the default storage location of US user data. Today, 100 percent of US user traffic is being routed to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. We still use our US and Singapore data centers for backup, but as we continue our work, we expect to delete US users’ private data from our own data centers and fully pivot to Oracle cloud servers located in the US. Together, these changes will enforce additional employee protections, provide more safeguards, and further minimize data transfer outside of the US.
#TikTok now says they’ve migrated US user data to an Oracle data center in Texas, presumably to keep it out of the CCP’s hands. That seems like small comfort given what’s been going for years…
— Eric M. Jackson (@ericmjackson) June 17, 2022
According to Buzzfeed, Oracle will store the data in a Texas data center, but it will be more of a Bare Metal offering than a regular Oracle Cloud infrastructure service.
TikTok also stated that it is collaborating with Oracle to build data management policies that would be audited and managed by the cloud firm. TikTok’s user data will be managed completely by US-based leadership and teams as a result of operational adjustments.
In 2020, then-President Trump signed an order requiring ByteDance to sell its Tiktok operations in the United States, with Oracle on the verge of acquiring the business. After President Biden took office, the proposal was finally scrapped.
Later reports claimed that the social networking company was still planning to choose Oracle Cloud as its preferred cloud provider, therefore taking a large client from one of its competitors.
The corporation is thought to have struck a three-year contract with
for at least $800 million in 2019. TikTok was reported to be Google’s second-largest customer (after Apple) in 2021, with 470 petabytes of data saved.According to North American Data Centers, TikTok inked lease arrangements worth more than 90MW in the United States last year (NADC).
TikTok plans to store and analyze data in a new facility, its building at Echelon’s data center property in Clondalkin, Ireland, in Europe.
According to a revelation published by Buzzfeed this week, Chinese employees had access to US consumer data. ByteDance personnel in China have routinely accessed non-public data regarding US TikTok customers, according to leaked audio from more than 80 internal TikTok sessions. According to the recordings, US personnel did not have authorization or knowledge of how to access the material on their own.
